CHENNAI: The Ministry of Railways is working on running 75-78 Vande Bharat trains, including the 13 rolled out already, connecting popular pilgrimage and tourist circuits in the country by August 15 this year.
“If everything goes in a planned way, most tourists and pilgrimage places will be reachable by Vande Bharat trains by August 15, 2023,” said a railway official, adding both the PM and railway minister are serious about this target. This train will generate huge revenues if India’s almost all famous pilgrimage places of all religions are connected through the service of this train, he added.
According to sources, South India is likely to get more Vande Bharat trains before 2024 linking pilgrimage, commercial and tourist places with state capitals. At present, 13 Vande Bharat trains are operating on different routes. Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently flagged off the Vande Bharat train between Secunderable-Tirupati.
A senior railway official, speaking to this newspaper in Chennai, said the Vande Bharat trains are running with over 100 per cent occupancy since the day its first service was started between New Delhi and Varanasi by the PM. In the next few days, Mahakal Ujjain temple and Ajmer Sharif shrine are set to be reachable by the Vande Bharat train, he said.
“The New Delhi-Varanasi Vande Bharat train has registered record earnings of more than Rs 92.29 crore, maintaining 100 per cent occupancy on the completion of a year of its services from 2019 to 2020,” an official said. The government has announced to roll out 400 Vande Bharat trains in the next few years to make an estimate earnings of over Rs 40,000 crores. Emboldened by earnings, the railway is also working to roll out the sleeper version of Vande Bharat trains by 2024-25 as works on it in progress.
According to a conservative estimate, Vande Bharat train services are benefiting more than 15 lakh people every month, including students, traders and professionals who mostly now prefer to travel by this train. The prominent routes on which the services of Vande Bharat are available now include the New Delhi -Varanasi, Nagpur -Bilaspur, Chennai Coimbatore, Secunderabad -Tirupati, Mumbai Gandhinagar and How-New Jalpaiguri, among others.